we show off our different scarlet letters
As Asta’s hands lift to her face, Flora lets her eyes fall shut—not because she doesn’t want to look at him, but because she can. Because there’s safety here, in the blood-warm weight of his palms and the steadiness of his touch. Her body doesn’t brace, doesn’t tense, doesn’t prepare for pain or rejection; it simply rests, just for a moment, leaning into the quiet certainty of him.
When his forehead touches hers, she exhales like it’s instinct, like some hidden part of her has been waiting for the signal to release. He smells the way he always does—something sweet and sharp like cherries and sun-split bark, layered now with the metallic tang of blood and the warmth of fire long since doused. Flora leans against him as he speaks, forehead still brushing his, lashes lowering as though the closeness might help her understand the parts of herself he sees so clearly. Her breath is slow now, heavy with the kind of stillness that settles after something unnameable has passed through.
When he pulls back to gesture toward the wolf, she follows his hand, watches the way he moves, how easy it is for him to slip back into work, into motion. The way the blade answers to him, neat and clinical, carving through fur and meat like it was always meant to. There’s no hesitation in it. No guilt. Flora watches it all, something dull and aching curling beneath her ribs. A kind of envy. A kind of grief. "I wish you could do that to parts me," she says quietly, eyes still on the wolf’s torn-open chest. Perhaps if Asta could cut out the parts of her that refused to heal, that remained infected, that pushed her towards bitterness or pettiness, then maybe she could finally start to heal. She smiles, but it’s crooked, soft around the edges in a way that’s almost sad before her gaze drifts upward again, catching his face in profile; blood against olive, myth carved into the shape of something painfully real. "Would you still be like this," she murmurs, "if you hadn't found Danta?"
She doesn’t ask it like she’s doubting him, she asks it like she’s trying to find the shape of something half-buried inside herself. Because the truth is, she doesn’t really know Asta without Danta, but certainly the butcher has told her enough and she wonders which parts of him would have remained calcified without love. For all he’s said about not being alone, about mastering darkness instead of letting it win, Flora can’t help but wonder if this—this peace, this control, this sense of direction—is only possible because he’s loved. Because someone stayed and because he loved them back.
When his forehead touches hers, she exhales like it’s instinct, like some hidden part of her has been waiting for the signal to release. He smells the way he always does—something sweet and sharp like cherries and sun-split bark, layered now with the metallic tang of blood and the warmth of fire long since doused. Flora leans against him as he speaks, forehead still brushing his, lashes lowering as though the closeness might help her understand the parts of herself he sees so clearly. Her breath is slow now, heavy with the kind of stillness that settles after something unnameable has passed through.
When he pulls back to gesture toward the wolf, she follows his hand, watches the way he moves, how easy it is for him to slip back into work, into motion. The way the blade answers to him, neat and clinical, carving through fur and meat like it was always meant to. There’s no hesitation in it. No guilt. Flora watches it all, something dull and aching curling beneath her ribs. A kind of envy. A kind of grief. "I wish you could do that to parts me," she says quietly, eyes still on the wolf’s torn-open chest. Perhaps if Asta could cut out the parts of her that refused to heal, that remained infected, that pushed her towards bitterness or pettiness, then maybe she could finally start to heal. She smiles, but it’s crooked, soft around the edges in a way that’s almost sad before her gaze drifts upward again, catching his face in profile; blood against olive, myth carved into the shape of something painfully real. "Would you still be like this," she murmurs, "if you hadn't found Danta?"
She doesn’t ask it like she’s doubting him, she asks it like she’s trying to find the shape of something half-buried inside herself. Because the truth is, she doesn’t really know Asta without Danta, but certainly the butcher has told her enough and she wonders which parts of him would have remained calcified without love. For all he’s said about not being alone, about mastering darkness instead of letting it win, Flora can’t help but wonder if this—this peace, this control, this sense of direction—is only possible because he’s loved. Because someone stayed and because he loved them back.
